Operation Lifesaver (OL) Canada – a not-for-profit organisation dedicated to preventing incidents at level crossings as a result of trespassing on railway property – has been working to find new and innovative ways to spread its rail safety message across the country. Sarah Mayes, OL’s National Director, provides more information.

In April 2017, OL launched a virtual-reality (VR) rail-safety campaign called Look.Listen.Live1.The campaign centres around two VR videos: The first is filmed from the perspective of a person taking an illegal shortcut across railway tracks2 and the second, from the perspective of someone driving around the lowered gates at a rail crossing3, trying to beat an oncoming train. Spoiler alert: Both videos end in tragedy.

The campaign was promoted through a combination of social media, web and billboard advertisements and OL shared the early results of its efforts at the 2017 International Level Crossing Awareness Day conference (ILCAD). Two months after its launch, Look.Listen.Live. had already generated close to 4.8 million impressions through social media and digital advertisements alone.

OL has expanded on the campaign in 2018 by developing new videos for key audiences, such as snowmobilers4, all-terrain vehicle riders5 and commuters, and by refreshing its website and communications materials6 to make them consistent with the Look.Listen.Live. brand. All of OL’s VR videos are available on its campaign website and can be viewed with or without a VR headset or cardboard viewer.

Evolving the Look.Listen.Live. campaign in this way has helped it to gain traction – generating more than 30 million impressions since OL first launched it in April 2017 (significantly more than originally projected), as well as more than 125,000 views of the campaign videos.

So why does this particular campaign seem to resonate with the public? Likely because it allows people to personallyexperience an incident with a train. Seeing is believing and VR videos allow people to see first-hand how quickly and quietly a train can sneak up on them. VR is also proving to be a particularly good way to connect with 18 to 35-year-olds – the demographic typically involved in trespassing and crossing incidents in Canada.

Beyond just ‘scaring people safe’, OL is planning to use VR to develop training materials for new and professional drivers in the next six months. Unlike its live-action Look.Listen.Live. videos, these VRs will be completely computer-generated and interactive – requiring viewers to make decisions in real-time when faced with safety scenarios and allowing them to experience different endings depending on their choices.

But OL is also employing more traditional approaches in its rail-safety public awareness campaigns. Sharing the cautionary tales of those involved in rail incidents still resonates strongly with OL’s audiences. In 2017, OL produced a short documentary-style video called Scott’s Story7, which profiled a young man who lost an arm and a leg to an incident with a train in 2012. Based on the performance of that video on social media, OL will be developing a new campaign called #STOPTrackTragedies for Rail Safety Week 2018 (23-29 September 2018). The campaign, which is being produced in partnership with OL in the U.S., will include six videos (four produced in Canada, two in the U.S.) which tell the personal stories of those affected by rail incidents – including friends and family, first responders and locomotive engineers. One video will be launched each day over the course of Rail Safety Week and the campaign will be promoted through social media, digital and in-kind broadcast ads.

Of course, none of OL’s campaigns would be as successful as they are without the support of its many partners and volunteers. In February 2018, OL launched its new Rail Safety Ambassador Programme to recruit Canadians across the country to help spread the word about rail safety in their communities and online. New applicants are always encouraged to register8 and those interested in participating in face-to-face outreach are required to provide a police record check with vulnerable sector clearance and complete an online training module. Since the launch of the programme, OL has recruited almost 150 new Rail Safety Ambassadors who will have an invaluable role to play in disseminating its campaigns over the next few years.

Finally, OL will be working to solicit government and corporate funding for a new national railway suicide prevention campaign in 2018. While it is in the preliminary stages, OL and its railway partners recognise that an evidence- and community-based approach to suicide prevention – one that aims to de-stigmatise suicide and connect at-risk individuals with help – will go a long way towards reducing the number of tragic incidents occurring on Canadian rail lines each year. OL plans to launch its new campaign in early-2019, with ads in stations and on trains and suicide prevention signage on railway rights-of-way across Canada, linking at-risk individuals with Canada’s new national suicide prevention service. OL’s hope is that it can emulate the successes of similar international efforts – most notably Network Rail’s We Listen9 and Small Talk Saves Lives10campaigns, delivered in partnership with the UK charity the Samaritans – with its own made-in-Canada initiative.

Biography

Sarah Mayes is National Director of Operation Lifesaver Canada and has more than 15 years of combined media, communications and project-management experience. Most recently, Sarah served as the Railway Association of Canada’s Director of Public Affairs, managing the association’s day-to-day communications and media relations and overseeing its national Pulling for Canada advertising campaign. Prior to joining the association world, Sarah worked as an Associate Producer and Reporter for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), as an Online Journalist for CBC.ca and in the CBC’s national political bureau as a Researcher and Writer for Politics with Don Newman. Sarah holds a Bachelor of Science from McGill University (2001).

This website uses cookies to enable, optimise and analyse site operations, as well as to provide personalised content and allow you to connect to social media. By clicking "I agree" you consent to the use of cookies for non-essential functions and the related processing of personal data. You can adjust your cookie and associated data processing preferences at any time via our "Cookie Settings". Please view our Cookie Policy to learn more about the use of cookies on our website.

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorised as "Necessary" are stored on your browser as they are as essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. For our other types of cookies "Advertising & Targeting", "Analytics" and "Performance", these help us analyse and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these different types of cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience. You can adjust the available sliders to 'Enabled' or 'Disabled', then click 'Save and Accept'. View our Cookie Policy page.

Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.

Cookie

Description

cookielawinfo-checkbox-advertising-targeting

The cookie is set by GDPR cookie consent to record the user consent for the cookies in the category "Advertising & Targeting".

cookielawinfo-checkbox-analytics

This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent WordPress Plugin. The cookie is used to remember the user consent for the cookies under the category "Analytics".

cookielawinfo-checkbox-necessary

This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary".

cookielawinfo-checkbox-performance

This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent WordPress Plugin. The cookie is used to remember the user consent for the cookies under the category "Performance".

PHPSESSID

This cookie is native to PHP applications. The cookie is used to store and identify a users' unique session ID for the purpose of managing user session on the website. The cookie is a session cookies and is deleted when all the browser windows are closed.

viewed_cookie_policy

The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. It does not store any personal data.

zmember_logged

This session cookie is served by our membership/subscription system and controls whether you are able to see content which is only available to logged in users.

__cfduid

The cookie is set by CloudFare. The cookie is used to identify individual clients behind a shared IP address and apply security settings on a per-client basis. It does not correspond to any user ID in the web application and does not store any personally identifiable information.

Performance cookies are includes cookies that deliver enhanced functionalities of the website, such as caching. These cookies do not store any personal information.

Cookie

Description

cf_ob_info

This cookie is set by Cloudflare content delivery network and, in conjunction with the cookie 'cf_use_ob', is used to determine whether it should continue serving “Always Online” until the cookie expires.

cf_use_ob

This cookie is set by Cloudflare content delivery network and is used to determine whether it should continue serving “Always Online” until the cookie expires.

free_subscription_only

This session cookie is served by our membership/subscription system and controls which types of content you are able to access.

ls_smartpush

This cookie is set by Litespeed Server and allows the server to store settings to help improve performance of the site.

one_signal_sdk_db

This cookie is set by OneSignal push notifications and is used for storing user preferences in connection with their notification permission status.

YSC

This cookie is set by Youtube and is used to track the views of embedded videos.

Analytics cookies collect information about your use of the content, and in combination with previously collected information, are used to measure, understand, and report on your usage of this website.

Cookie

Description

bcookie

This cookie is set by LinkedIn. The purpose of the cookie is to enable LinkedIn functionalities on the page.

GPS

This cookie is set by YouTube and registers a unique ID for tracking users based on their geographical location

lang

This cookie is set by LinkedIn and is used to store the language preferences of a user to serve up content in that stored language the next time user visit the website.

lidc

This cookie is set by LinkedIn and used for routing.

lissc

This cookie is set by LinkedIn share Buttons and ad tags.

vuid

We embed videos from our official Vimeo channel. When you press play, Vimeo will drop third party cookies to enable the video to play and to see how long a viewer has watched the video. This cookie does not track individuals.

wow.anonymousId

This cookie is set by Spotler and tracks an anonymous visitor ID.

wow.schedule

This cookie is set by Spotler and enables it to track the Load Balance Session Queue.

wow.session

This cookie is set by Spotler to track the Internet Information Services (IIS) session state.

wow.utmvalues

This cookie is set by Spotler and stores the UTM values for the session. UTM values are specific text strings that are appended to URLs that allow Communigator to track the URLs and the UTM values when they get clicked on.

_ga

This cookie is set by Google Analytics and is used to calculate visitor, session, campaign data and keep track of site usage for the site's analytics report. It stores information anonymously and assign a randomly generated number to identify unique visitors.

_gat

This cookies is set by Google Universal Analytics to throttle the request rate to limit the collection of data on high traffic sites.

_gid

This cookie is set by Google Analytics and is used to store information of how visitors use a website and helps in creating an analytics report of how the website is doing. The data collected including the number visitors, the source where they have come from, and the pages visited in an anonymous form.

Advertising and targeting cookies help us provide our visitors with relevant ads and marketing campaigns.

Cookie

Description

advanced_ads_browser_width

This cookie is set by Advanced Ads and measures the browser width.

advanced_ads_page_impressions

This cookie is set by Advanced Ads and measures the number of previous page impressions.

advanced_ads_pro_server_info

This cookie is set by Advanced Ads and sets geo-location, user role and user capabilities. It is used by cache busting in Advanced Ads Pro when the appropriate visitor conditions are used.

advanced_ads_pro_visitor_referrer

This cookie is set by Advanced Ads and sets the referrer URL.

bscookie

This cookie is a browser ID cookie set by LinkedIn share Buttons and ad tags.

IDE

This cookie is set by Google DoubleClick and stores information about how the user uses the website and any other advertisement before visiting the website. This is used to present users with ads that are relevant to them according to the user profile.

li_sugr

This cookie is set by LinkedIn and is used for tracking.

UserMatchHistory

This cookie is set by Linkedin and is used to track visitors on multiple websites, in order to present relevant advertisement based on the visitor's preferences.

VISITOR_INFO1_LIVE

This cookie is set by YouTube. Used to track the information of the embedded YouTube videos on a website.